CTA chose Microsoft as its “cloud platform provider” to run CES 2021 as a virtual event, said the association Monday. CES will use Microsoft Azure cloud computing, Microsoft Teams videoconferencing and the Microsoft Power apps platform to deliver “an exhibitor showcase, media events, conference programming, networking events and more,” said CTA. It picked Microsoft after a “rigorous” search for the company’s “technical expertise, global scale and experience in creating [a] compelling digital event,” it said. CTA “can’t share contract details,” emailed Jamie Kaplan, senior director-global event communications. The association issued a request for information and evaluated more than 40 “companies and technologies” before picking Microsoft, she said. As for whether the contract includes a Microsoft keynote component, “we will be sharing more information about our keynotes in the coming weeks and months,” she said. Registration opens Dec. 1 for the Jan. 11-14 event.

Sony, a spectrum access system operator in the citizens broadband radio service band, asked the FCC to approve it as an environmental sensing capability provider, in a Wednesday posting in docket 15-319. Parts were redacted.

Twitter won’t allow anyone to use the platform “to manipulate or interfere in elections,” blogged the company Friday. People on Twitter, including candidates for office, will be barred from claiming an election win “before it is authoritatively called,” it said. “We require either an announcement from state election officials, or a public projection from at least two authoritative, national news outlets that make independent election calls.” Starting this week, when someone tries to retweet a post labeled as containing “misleading information,” they will see a prompt “pointing them to credible information about the topic before they are able to amplify it,” said the company. “Tweets with labels are already de-amplified through our own recommendation systems and these new prompts will give individuals more context.” Facebook announced its own election safeguards earlier in the week, stipulating its policy for contested races. If the candidate declared the winner by major media outlets “is contested by another candidate or party, we will show the name of the declared winning candidate with notifications at the top of Facebook and Instagram, as well as label posts from presidential candidates, with the declared winner’s name and a link to the Voting Information Center,” it said. If a candidate declares “premature victory,” Facebook will add to the notifications that “counting is still in progress and no winner has been determined.”

The Zigbee Alliance launched a Europe Interest Group to strengthen standards globally, with a focus on the Connected Home over IP project (CHIP), it said Thursday. CHIP membership is open to all alliance participants and promoters, it said, including those with interests in the commercial IoT market. Group chair is alliance board member Ulf Axelsson, IoT architect, Ikea.

CEDIA launched a career center for employers and job seekers, it said Wednesday. Companies can post open positions including internships, apprenticeships, contractor and gig work. Job seekers can create a personal profile with resume and references. Some 54% of industry employers surveyed in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., Australia, New Zealand and Mexico cite finding qualified employees as their top issue.

The HDBaseT Alliance updated its certified products list in cooperation with AV-iQ, adding the ability to search and filter products based on supported HDBaseT features. It now offers product comparison and matching tools, access to product specifications and documentation.

CEDIA announced the 2021-2022 board election is open. Members can use the ballot (login) to vote for four candidates. They are Steven Brawner, ProAudio, Atlanta; Shannon Bush, AVDG, San Jose; Albert Mizrahi, SmartLab, Mexico City; Eddie Shapiro, SmartTouch USA, Bethesda, Maryland; Michael Sherman, Henri, Paris.

The FCC closed the door on a proceeding about whether to require MVPDs to provide unbundled flows of programming information to those who want to make new navigation devices, in a docket 16-42 order Friday. The order also axed the CableCARD consumer support rules and requirement that big cable operators report such deployments. Democratic commissioners concurred but didn't issue statements. The commission said there are "serious and unresolved" issues on copyright and multichannel video programming security in its navigation device rules proposal, and the CableCARD consumer support rules "no longer serve a useful purpose." The regulator began requiring cable to report CableCARD deployments in 2005 to answer consumer tech industry complaints that cable operators were backing CableCARDs only halfheartedly (see 0510050137).

Communications Decency Act Section 230 should be modified to even the playing field between tech companies and other third-party content providers, AT&T blogged Monday. The company will comment to the FCC Wednesday (see 2008120050), arguing “online platforms should be more accountable for, and more transparent about, the decisions they control,” wrote Executive Vice President-Regulatory and State External Affairs Joan Marsh. Congress didn’t have any way of predicting tech companies would use Section 230 as a shield from frivolous lawsuits and “every day responsibilities,” she wrote: Platform content decisions are “shrouded in obscurity, away from public view, in a world where black-box algorithms and non-negotiable terms pick winners and losers.”

The FCC intends to “finalize new rules … later this year” to allow TV white spaces devices to operate with higher power in less-congested areas, Chairman Ajit Pai told House Communications Subcommittee Vice Chair Doris Matsui, D-Calif., and 13 other lawmakers in letters released Monday. Microsoft and others urged the FCC to act on TVWS, though there was opposition (see 2006030023). Matsui and the other lawmakers supported the NPRM in their June letter to Pai. “Our proposals will expand broadband availability for more rural Americans,” Pai said. “I also agree with your assessment that the current [COVID-19] pandemic has put our need for spectrum in sharp relief.” The spectrum that TVWS devices operate in “allows for the delivery of services over relatively longer distances and is better suited to deal with variations of terrain,” Pai said. “This makes it more attractive for providing broadband in rural and remote areas. The devices operate on an unlicensed basis, reducing barriers to entry.”